Académique Documents
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SOCIAL SIN
Sinful structures a) institutions that
oppress, violate human dignity, stifle freedom, impose gross inequality. b) situations that promote and facilitate selfishness c) complicity of persons due to Indifference.
In any moment of decision, The BEST THING you can do is the RIGHT THING; The NEXT BEST THING is the WRONG THING; And the WORST thing you can do is NOTHING Theodore Roosevelt
"The hottest places in hell are reserved for those who, in time of great moral crisis, maintain their neutrality." - - Dante Alighieri, poet
(1265-1321)
I know your works: you are neither cold nor hot. Would that you were either cold or hot! So, because you are lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of my mouth.
Revelation 3:15-16
It follows that political authority, either within the political community as such or through organizations representing the state, must be exercised within the limits of the moral order and directed towards the common good, understood in the dynamic sense of the term, according to the juridical order legitimately established or due to be established. Citizens, then, are bound in conscience to obey. Accordingly, the responsibility, the status, and the importance of the rulers of a state are clear.
The Church in the Modern World,#74
Pope Benedict XVI reminded the lay faithful of their direct duty to work for a just ordering of society and to take part in public life in a personal capacity (Deus Caritas
Est 29).
Direct participation in the political order is the special responsibility of the laity in the Church. it is their specific task to renew the temporal order according to Gospel principles and values (CBCP, Pastoral Exhortation on Philippine Politics, 1997).
CST ON LABOR/WORK
It is right to struggle against an unjust economic system that does not uphold the priority of the human being over capital and land. Centesimus Annus (The Hundredth Year) #35
John Paul II, 1991
Work is in the first place "for the worker" and not the worker "for work." Work itself can have greater or lesser objective value, but all work should be judged by the measure of dignity given to the person who carries it out. Laborem Exercens (On Human Work) #6
John Paul II, 1981
We consider it our duty to reaffirm that the remuneration of work is not something that can be left to the laws of the marketplace; nor should it be a decision left to the will of the more powerful. It must be determined in accordance with justice and equity; which means that workers must be paid a wage which allows them to live a truly human life and to fulfill their family obligations in a worthy manner.
Mater et Magistra (Mother and Teacher) #71 Pope John XXIII, 1961
moral foundation : how we treat each other, the spirit of benevolence, service, contribution BUT: keep a hidden agenda, a secret life, and justify / rationalize their activities.
No natural laws: rational lies and have social mores or political wills that are totally divorced from natural laws and principles.
CST ON BUSINESS
There is a growing conviction that business management cannot concern itself only with the interests of the proprietors, but must also assume responsibility for all the other stakeholders who contribute to the life of the business : the workers, the clients, the suppliers of various elements of production, the community of reference
Benedict XVI, Caritas in Veritate, # 40.
It is good for people to realize that purchasing is always a moral and not simply economic act. Hence the consumer has a specific social responsibility, which goes hand in hand with the social responsibility of the enterprise.
Caritas in Veritate (#66)
pleasures w/o sense of responsibility Challenge : To give and take, to live selflessly, to be sensitive, to be considerate. No sense of social responsibility or accountability in pleasurable activities.
Todays pleasures..
Extra-marital affairs / no commitment Spending way into overwhelming debt. Extravagance / Ostentatious Display of Wealth Gambling away life-savings ( in casinos or in business ). Running away from family (physically or emotionally). Drugs or alcoholism Failing to put best foot forward at work. Workaholism Sloth Falling into a fantasy life via porn sites.
CST ON PLEASURE
Moral life requires that we recognize in ourselves the tendency to sin and acknowledge ourselves as sinners when we have done evil. Today this sense of sin seems to have been radically weakened by secularism: we are caught up in the flagrant consumerism that surrounds us. We are unconsciously influenced by the modern behaviorist psychologies that identify sin with morbid guilt feelings or with mere transgressions of legal norms . And through radio, TV and the cinema, we continually face so many examples of bribery and corruption in business and government, cheating in family life and lying in personal relationships, that we often end up rationalizing for our own misdeeds: Anyway, everybody does it, or I had to do it because.. ..
Catechism for Filipino Catholics # 764
Great numbers of people are acutely conscious of being deprived of the worlds goods through injustice and unfair distribution (GS 9). In the midst of huge numbers deprived of the absolute necessities of life there are some who live in riches and squander their wealth.... Luxury and misery exist side by side (GS 63). PCP II speaks of how the Christian conscience must recoil at the sins committed against the poor: so many workers denied just wages to maintain living standards of the few. . . so many poor farmers tilling lands they will never own . . . so much economic and political power used selfishly to serve the few . . . (PCP II 267). Catechism for Filipino Catholics 186
Todays Realities
- Too much premium on grade performance : Cheating - Passing through extra projects - Commercialization of Education - What can be done vs. how to do
CST ON EDUCATION
386. But to so ignore the fact of our wounded human nature, our inclination to self-centeredness and pride has led to grave errors in the areas of education, politics, social action and morals (CCC 407-9; cf. CA 25). Since the Christian vocation is a call to transform oneself and society with God's help, the educational efforts of the Church must encompass the twin purposes of personal sanctification and social reform in the light of Christian values.
Economic Justice for All, #341
education demands a renewal of heart, a renewal based on the recognition of sin in its individual and social manifestations. It will likewise awaken a critical sense, which will lead us to reflect on the society in which we live and on its values...... In the developing countries, the principal aim of this education of justice consists in an attempt to awaken consciences to a knowledge of the concrete situation and in a call to secure a total improvement; by these means the transformation of the world has already begun. Justice in the World, #51
If science becomes all technique and technology : quickly degenerates into man against humanity.
MAN becomes victims of our own technocracy : little understanding of the higher human purposes that the technology is striving to serve
Todays Realities
ARTIFICIAL INSEMINATION TRANSEXUALISM SURROGACY ABORTION GENETIC ENGINEERING STEM CELL RESEARCH ANTI-LIFE PROGRAMS
CST ON TECHNOLOGY
The most important human endeavor is the striving for morality in our actions. Our Albert Einstein
Wherefore, whatever the progress in technology and economic life, there can be neither justice nor peace in the world, so long as men fail to realize how great is their dignity; for they have been created by God and are His children. Mother and Teacher, #215 Economics and technology have no meaning except from the human person whom they should serve. And the human person is only truly human in as far as, master of one's own acts and judge of their worth, one is author of one's own advancement, in keeping with the nature which was given to human beings by the Creator. ( Populorum Progressio #34)
CST ON TECHNOLOGY
When the sole criterion of truth is efficiency and utility, development is automatically denied and human freedom is authentic only when it responds to the fascination of technology with decisions that are the fruit of moral responsibility.
( Caritas in Veritate 70)
Entranced by an exclusive reliance on technology, reason without faith is doomed to flounder in an illusion of its own omnipotence. Faith without reason risks being cut off from everyday life. ( CV 74)
REALITIES
FOLK RELIGIOSITY W/O UNDERSTANDING EMPTY SPIRITUALITY PIETISTIC / RITUALISM WITHOUT SOCIAL INVOLVEMENT
CST ON WORSHIP
Action on behalf of justice and participation in the transformation of the world fully appear to us as a constitutive dimension of the preaching of the Gospel, or in other words, of the Church's mission for the redemption of the human race and its liberation from every oppressive situation.Justice in the World (#6) For unless the Christian message of love and justice shows its effectiveness through action in the cause of justice in the world, it will only with difficulty gain credibility with the people of our times. Justice in the World (#35)
It is no less mistaken to think that we may immerse ourselves in earthly activities as if these latter were utterly foreign to religion, and religion were nothing more than the fulfilment of acts of worship and the observance of a few moral obligations. One of the gravest errors of our time is the dichotomy between the faith which many profess and their day-to-day conduct. As far back as the Old Testament the prophets vehemently denounced this scandal, and in the New Testament Christ himself even more forcibly threatened it with severe punishment. Let there, then, be no such pernicious opposition between professional and social activity on the one hand and religious life on the other. Christians who shirk their temporal duties shirk their duties towards his neighbor, neglect God himself, and endanger their eternal salvation.The Church in the Modern World (#43)
AUTHENTIC DEVELOPMENT
SECULAR: ( UN )
Understanding DEVELOPMENT simply as transfer of capital and technology to solve underdevelopment has been a failure.
Christian Notion
1. Measured and Oriented acc. to man : totality. 2. Inclusion of have nots 3. Shared Decision Making 4. Needs Decentralization 5. Needs Structural Change 6. Never Violent - respect for culture
Solidarity
firm and persevering determination to commit oneself to the common good, and a commitment to the good of ones neighbor with the readiness to lose oneself for the sake of the other instead of exploiting, oppressing and taking advantage of others. join forces in freedom for the attainment of legitimate ends.
Solidarity..2
requires all men. participate in the management of all the activities in economic, political and cultural life while overcoming purely individualistic interests.
An urgent demand of faith . Filipinos: interdependence calls for doing away with political blocs and transforming distrust into collaboration.
Solidarity 3 Aid: no strings attached The bond of common humanity is not fear but love expressed in loyal collaboration. war can no longer be an instrumentof justice NEED FOR negotiation and dialogue.
Christian Justice
correct praxisof justice : requires a correct doctrine of justice: superficial activism . Faith and Action: (OT) Therecan beno fidelity to God without justice towardsmen; without the practice of justice, there can be no true worship.
Justice2
Church Tradition: firm willto give each person or social groups what belongs to him or them.
Commutative Justice. Distributive Justice: A fair share is not necessarilyan equal share. Contributive or Legal Justice.
Social Justice requires looking into the real situation of different groups of people give them their due
checks the inherent flaws and ambiguities of literal adherence to the classical types of justice.
Justice3
inherent flaws and ambiguities of literal adherence to the classical types of justice.
ambiguities: 1) more of a subjective virtue leading to the possibility of neglecting the objective or external aspect of justice. 2) considers the law as its object and situates itself within the established order, hence, losing the possibility of doing a critique about the given structure.
3) tends to orient such strictness toward the acceptable or passable minimum, thus encouraging minimalism and legalism. 4) lead to a neglect of the moral rectification of social structures.
If justice means to give to each one his/her due this due should not be interpreted according to the standards of the established order but from the ethical requirements of just social relations.
SOCIAL JUSTICE
COMPONENTS OF JUSTICE
1. Sufficient life-goods : economic rights : principle of stewardship as ethical basis 2. dignity of the human person cultural rights : ethical basis : person is the the image and likeness of God 3. Participation: political rights : 4. Solidarity:
ethical basis: every person to contribute to the building of Gods Kingdom on earth
Ethical basis: Human beings are created to the image of God who is a Trinity of Persons (community).